Skyscrapers in the background.

terranova's right. Here's what the art book has to say about future Iowa (along with one small pic of the three massive buildings)...

 

That's under ground, right?

 

^ I've never seen Things to Come but Wikipedia does say it's underground.

 

I LOL'd!


There would have to be some big ass SAD lights if we all lived underground. Otherwise the SSRI makers would have their hands full!

 

^ SAD. SSRI. What is meaning, explain plz?

 

Huh?

 

SAD - Seasonal Affective Disorder. Basically, depression brought on by insufficent sunlight in the winter months. Can be treated with special artificial lights that replicate natural light.

SSRI - Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. A type of antidepressant drug.

 

If they are giant farms as the art book says, then it represents a very different way of living than humans have done before.

I guess everything is hydroponic or something else? The imagination can run wild.

 

Think of the poor cows and pigs on the 500th floor. They must get nosebleeds!

 

I wonder why they would need to have a whole new way of farming like that. The Iowa countryside as seen in that film didn't look like it needed that sort of thing. I assumed that it would still be possible to have a traditional ground based farm.

 

While the countryside does look like it could support traditional farming, maybe humans in the 23rd century are vegetarians ala 3001 A Final Odyssey.

Enlightened humans and all that.

 

^ Plenty of present day farms raise vegetable crops. Not all farmers raise cattle or poultry.

And there will always be humans who will eat meat.

 

If there isn't proper environmental controls for that kind of thing, I can imagine the lower floors being devoted to livestock and the higher levels to crops.

 

Regardless of whether cities are above ground or below, arcological or traditional, they can either be comfortable or not. Apartments could be the size of 50-foot high football fields or arm-length closets and they could still be good or bad. The holodecks can make tiny spaces whole valleys. That image from Things to Come still looks claustrophobic to me. It can go either way.

Regarding the idea that "I 'know' a window is fake" means little if I can look out it and see NO different than the real thing and smell the honeysuckle on the warm air breezing in through it. Imagine living in a place where you wouldn't know you were indoors if someone didn't tell you. It's a sinister thought only if you assume the classic sci-fi threat of not being able to leave. Hell, would it matter if the window was real or not if when you stepped through it, a transporter took you to the location it showed?

 

Re: Skyscrapers in the background

I dunno, when Kirk says the ship responsible for the attack was Romulan and Pike responds "Romulan!?" I always read Pike's reaction as incredulous, presumably because Romulans had until then still never been seen.

But you're right. It's ambiguous enough that the audience can fill in the blanks for themselves.

 

We see New Orleans in DS9.

 

Live streaming view of whatever you choose outside your window would be cool, with transport to that area should you decide to climb out the actual window, lol. A portal.

 

Your very own Iconian gateway!

What gets me is that a lot of places you'd think would be comfortable yet aren't. I'd rather live in a comfortable megacity than a miserable traditional one. There are unusual factors to consider that ideological thinking overlooks. Pressure is one. A palatial apartment 10,000 feet underground is going to need pressure control.

Megacities can be intimidating to the human scale but I don't think necessarily have to be. After all, mountains are intimidating yet we still live on them. I don't know how I feel about living underground, but I think living above ground's just fine too if done right, and just because we have lived in comparatively modest cities, suburbs, and in the country so far doesn't mean they're fundamentally better or more human than new possibilities.

Edit: one more thing. I think scale is very important. The design of megacities should be so that the emphasis is on the citizens and its service and malleability to them and their endeavors. Too many skyscrapers today are about ego and intimidation and ostentation. I'd hate to see what modern architects and city planners would do given a trillion dollars.

Edit: one more more thing. Any great endeavor I think should be beautiful, balanced, malleable, and a testament to the human spirit.

 

One thing I'm sure a megacity would have, that my city definitely does not, is reliable mass transit. We have basically sod-all in that department (apart from some lameass bus service). I would LOVE for my city to have a subway, or at least light rail. Unfortunately we're not big enough, I guess.